Mr. Wetterstrom will assume the position of President of the ACCG Board of Directors for two years at the ANA convention in 2010. The position of Secretary and Executive Director remain unchanged and both posts are occupied by Wayne Sayles. It remains to see whether the changes in the top will be reflected in any change in ACCG policies concerning no-questions-asked collecting and its relationship to the illegal exploitation of the archaeological record all over the world as a source of saleable collectables.przez vcoins Ostatnio zmodyfikowane 2009-02-07 05:06
David Hendin - Treasurer
Bill Puetz - President
Wayne G. Sayles - Secretary
David R. Sear
Peter K. Tompa
David Welsh
Kerry K. Wetterstrom - President Elect
A blog commenting on various aspects of the private collecting and trade in archaeological artefacts today and their effect on the archaeological record.
Sunday, 8 February 2009
Who is who in the US Coin Dealers' Lobby group
It was as we suspected, the website of the ancient coin dealers’ lobby group the ACCG had failed to record a change in the leadership which had taken place within the organization last year. As a result of these changes at the ACCG annual meeting in 2008 Peter Tompa had lost the post of President of the Board of Directors to Bill Puetz – the owner and developer of VCoins.com, the largest ancient coin e-commerce site on the Internet. After I queried this yesterday on Nathan Elkins’ blog, the ACCG website was swiftly updated:
The ACCG thanks Mr. Barford for the publicity. One point of correction is that Mr. Tompa's post as president was not "lost" to Mr. Puetz. The President of the ACCG Board of Directors may not, under the guild bylaws, serve more than one term consecutively. The election of Mr. Puetz as President of the Board of Directors for the term 2008-2010 was unanimous. The Directors of the ACCG are nominated and elected by the membership at large and the officers are elected by and from the Board.
ReplyDeleteWayne G. Sayles
Secretary
Ancient Coin Collectors Guild
Oh, I do not think the ACCG with its "aggressively defending the hobby" needs any "publicity" from me.
ReplyDeleteI have been pointing out here for some time now that the ACCG website has failed to be properly updated and gives an impression that the Guild has somewhat run out of steam and run out of ideas and is not so concerned to use its website to keep its members in touch with what it is up to. http://www.accg.us/about/activities/
http://www.accg.us/issues/editorials/
the fact that members were not informed of the change in presidency when it happened is symptomatic.
Does the new president get to deliver a "state of the Guild" address outlining the direction he would like to see it developing in his tenure, and do members get to read it?
Although I do not presume to speak for the ACCG in making this comment, I would like to record my personal gratitude for Paul Barford's helpful contribution in creating this further opportunity for those interested in cultural property law to improve their understanding of the ACCG.
ReplyDeleteEvery organization of this type does have its detractors, and it is often the case that such detractors do more to create interest in, and increase support for, these organizations than those who openly espouse the cause of the organization.
Mr. Barford has become a well known personality in the "great cultural property war" as a result of his relentless, incessant attacks upon the legality and morality of private collecting of portable antiquities. His remarks are observed by many who are perplexed by what is taking place and unsure as to their own views on these issues. Mr. Barford's contributions have done much to assist such undecided individuals in forming their opinions.
It is my personal view that Paul Barford has done far more to mobilize the inherently peaceful, unaggressive collecting community than most of those (notably including myself) who have been ringing the tocsin of alarm regarding radical archaeologists and their campaign to abolish private collecting.
Mr. Barford is not likely to win many plaudits from the ACCG for the fairness and objectivity of his statements, but they have actually had such a positive effect that he really ought to be recognized as an ACCG Benefactor. It is unfortunately impossible to extend such recognition to anyone who is not an ACCG Member.
A very well known, and long established German dealer in ancient coins today made this angry observation concerning the results of the campaign against private collecting of ancient artifacts such as coins:
"There is no law in Germany prohibiting selling or collecting ancient coins, however a few police and hardline archaeologists are taking the law in their own hands and are obviously threatening the ignorant staff of eBay with false accusations. Goodbye eBay, because they do not protect their clients from false accusations and give their addresses to the police, including those of collectors all over the world. So far in Germany hundreds of houses have been searched, many collections have been confiscated and their rightful owners have been accused of "Hehlerei" (fencing). The Fourth Reich has arrived and we have to defend the free market in Germany against these self-proclaimed "Führers".
No one has done more than Paul Barford to establish himself as the leader of the radical anticollecting movement. It is only appropriate and proper that he should now be saluted for his great achievement in becoming its online spokesman and propaganda leader.
Hail Barford!
Dave Welsh
dwelsh46@cox.net
Heil?
ReplyDeleteFor an archaeologist or anyone else, I would say there is nothing "radical" about being concerned about the future of the finite and fragile archaeological resource and the long term effects of the no-questions-asked market for collectables mined from it.
Nobody in my circles is "anticollecting". That's just another scare-myth. What we are clearly against however is the market in illicitly-obtained collectables at the expense of the archaeological record and the could-not-care-less attitudes of dealers and collectors which do nothing to combat it - of which your own vocal activities and the ACCG in general have become an epitome.
If polemic mobilises the collecting community to come up with some rational arguments of their own (instead of repeating the same old glib mantras and puerile ACCG jibes and nonsense) then it can only be a good thing. Let's have some proper debate about the real conservation issues with some sensible people, with some responsible collectors.